For those of you who haven't heard of him or his positions, I urge you to take a look at his site. He has an excellent takeon the immigration policy, is liked by McCain and by some democrats as well.He's a nice moderate choice.He probably has a decent enough chance of winning that votingfor him won't be a wasted vote if he gets on the ballot.

Although I was very impressed with Perry and the way he handled the Hurricane,I can't in good conscience vote for Republicans lately with them taking awaythe rights of gays and citizens.

Before you vote for Kinky, ask yourself if you knew these 10 things about Kinky (see http://stopkinky.blogspot.com for more details):

1. Kinky's own website quotes Kinky telling the New York Times, "I'm not pro-choice." Elsewhere on Kinky's website he SIMULTANEOUSLY claims Kinky believes in a woman's right to choose (apparently, Kinky's also believes he can have his cake and eat it, too).

2. At a recent death penalty trial, Kinky testified under oath that although "he used to support the death penalty, Friedman told jurors he's now against it." Yet Kinky's website also says "Kinky is not anti-death-penalty," and this blatant contradiction of Kinky's testimony under oath is exactly what Kinky told CBS News.

3. Kinky gave an interview to Susannah McNeely of Ruminator magazine where Kinky said "I voted for Gore" in 2000 "I was conflicted ... but I was not for Bush that time. Since then, though, we’ve become friends. And that’s what’s changed things.... I agree with most of his political positions overseas, his foreign policy.... What he’s been doing in the Near East and in the Middle East, he’s handling that well, I think." Yet that's clearly a lie because according to Kerr County voting records, Friedman voted in the 2004 presidential general election but not in any other contest since 1994.

4. Kinky wants to take money generated from sales tax and other state revenue sources and give that money away only to Texas property owning corporations and people with those owning the most valuable property getting the biggest windfall (Live in an apartment? Tough! Do you live in a modest house? Too bad!).

5. On a November 8, 2005, Kinky appeared on a nationally televised CNBC news program, where he was asked about his views on criminal punishment. Kinky replied, "Throw 'em in prison and throw away the key, and make 'em listen to a Negro talking to himself." When asked whether his use of the word "Negro" was racist, Kinky replied "no ... it's a charming word."

6. Kinky would address Texas' public education funding crisis by letting "the corporate sector bid on funding athletics." (What exactly does Kinky think the corporations will be getting from our children in exchange for their high bids?

7. Kinky proposes to deal with immigration issues by building a wall along the Texas-Mexico border and by outsource our border security to five Mexican generals who we'd pay based on how successfully they kept immigrants from crossing the border into Texas.

8. Kinky supports school prayer and posting the Ten Commandments in Texas classrooms (no word on whether Kinky has decided to post the Hebrew, Catholic, or Protestant version of the "Ten Commandments").

9. Kinky hasn't even gotten on the ballot yet, and he's already offered the top political appointment to make his biggest campaign contributor Secretary of State for Texas.

10. Kinky's candidacy is aimed a drawing votes from young, progressive voters who do not know where he stands on many issues, and yet Kinky has run for office before as a Republican, the only time Kinky said he voted for a Democrat in the past decade it turned out that Kinky lied and he actually didn't vote, Kinky did however vote for Bush/Cheney in 2004 and that proved to be the truth, Kinky has numerous Perry-supporting Republicans financially backing his petition drive, and if Kinky can draw off any significant number of progressive votes his candidacy will have the nearly certain effect of guaranteeing the re-election of arch-Republican Rick Perry.

Really, there's no need to be anonymous. I'm all for listening to other people's point of view.I do take issue with people's perception that the only legitimate votes are for the two top runners in polls. My version of democracy and voting is that I vote for the candidate I believe can do the best job in office, regardless of what the polls say. If everyone did the same, we'd probably live in a better world.

I posted anonymously because I not a LiveJournal user. You can check out my blog at http://stopkinky.blogspot.com.

When you say, "My version of democracy and voting is that I vote for the candidate I believe can do the best job in office, regardless of what the polls say," I couldn't agree more, but that's a parlimentary system of voting you describe and it doesn't work in a system like ours.

Also, I'm not advocating that you vote for either of the top two runners in the poll. The top candidate in the polls is Perry who's a complete failure in my book and I won't try to persuade you to favor Bell or Strayhorn (or the Green party or the Libertarian party), but I will try and dissuade you from supporting Kinky unless you actually agree with the political nonsense that he spouts as his incoherent platform.

What I don't like about Kinky, aside from his stance on just about every issue that matters to me, is that Kinky is targeting a group of voters who don't know where he stands on many issues and who would disagree with him if they did.

If you have signed Kinky's petition and you now regret it, you can fix that mistake simply by voting in the runoff election on April 11.

Here is how the Texas Secretary of State explains the situation:

Q. If I sign an independent candidate’s petition after the primary and then vote in a party primary runoff. What happens to my signature?

A. If the party you voted in had a nominee for the same office sought by the independent candidate at either the primary or primary runoff election, your signature is void.

That means you can vote in the Republican Party runoff where there is an interesting race for Court of Criminal Appeals Judge between Terry Keel and Charles Holcomb, and by voting in this runoff you can erase your signature on Kinky's petition.

Or you can vote in the Democratic Party runoff where there is an interesting race between a serious candidate for US Senator like Barbara Ann Radnofsky versus a vanity candidacy from Gene Kelly (he's not the song and dance man -- that guy's dead) and between two serious candidates for Lieutenant Governor: Ben Grant and Maria Luisa Alvarado. So if you regret signing Kinky's petition, you can fix that error by voting in this runoff election.

If you vote in either runoff election on April 11, that vote will have the effect of retroactively nullifying your ballot petition signature (Which reminds me, has Kinky ever said whether he favors the wider availability of the morning after emergency contraception pill? Nope).

If you have signed Kinky's petition and you don't regret it, "why the hell not"? (catchy phrase!)